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Our Matariki Celebration with Totara Park
Our Matariki Celebration
Kiwi:
In the Kiwi (Infant) room, we celebrated Matariki and its nine stars through having an interactive display board that was covered in a material that was relevant to the representation of what each star represented. We also provided creative art activities such as making 'starry night' playdough and collaging and incorporating music and movement into our learning. We did Matariki CD stories and books and learnt the Matariki macarena.
Kea:
Over the month of June, the Kea (toddlers) rooms learning journey into learning about Matariki involved using music, CD stories, and books to expand their learning about the Māori New Year. We also spent some time creating some salt sand, glow-in-the-dark stars and making our own star shapes at the carpentry table. We invited whanau to help, then to take home some yummy soup to share.
Kākā:
In the Kākā (Preschool) room, we celebrated the Māori New Year by exploring the nine stars of Matarik through song and dance, pukapuka and creative art. We harvested our gardens and planted carrots and cauliflower, incorporating Manaakitanga (kindness) and Kaitiakitanga (guardianship) as we nurtured our seedlings, showing appreciation for Papatūānuku. We all contributed painted feathers to make a korowai, and learnt new waiata about the Māori atua.
Due to Covid restrictions which prevented us from holding a whānau evening, we decided instead to provide some yummy soup dinner for our whānau to take home, which our Kākā room tamariki took great pride in making contributions to by bringing in vegetables from home and preparing these for our whānau and community (washing, peeling, and cutting).